


heartache to heartache (purple lipstick stains)

by ElasticElla



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Angst, Background Relationships, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Lily Evans Potter Lives, M/M, Multi, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-02
Updated: 2019-09-02
Packaged: 2020-10-05 08:33:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20485931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElasticElla/pseuds/ElasticElla
Summary: “Pettigrew broke the secret, the wards fell.” She swallows, makes herself say the last part, “James is dead.”





	heartache to heartache (purple lipstick stains)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [The_Wavesinger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Wavesinger/gifts).

Lily’s walking home, it’s nice sometimes to not apparate directly. Wizards often seem to forget how calming mundane life can be. To really take in the evening air, the hum of cicadas and the damp smell of earth. Severus even tried to make amends tonight, not that she’d forgive him so easily. It’s like-

Her heart stops, a jarring neon green nightmare above her half-destroyed home, and Lily runs inside. She can hear Harry crying, and she jumps up the steps, makes it to the nursery in record time. 

There’s a body on the rug. White noise floods her ears. Oh no, fuck, James, he can’t be- 

Only Harry’s crying keeps her from collapse, as she goes to the crib. There’s a new lightning bolt scar and god, she should have been here. She scoops Harry up, pulling her wand out. It takes a few minutes, a few attempts, and going downstairs to summon her patronus. 

“Pettigrew broke the secret, the wards fell.” She swallows, makes herself say the last part, “James is dead.” 

Her doe bounds away, and there’s a knock. Lily’s wand is pointed at the door, debating if she should leave or wait for Dumbledore. 

Severus walks in, and the blood drains from her face as she puts the last pieces together. Her hand shakes, unrestrained golden sparks flying from her wand. 

“You knew.” 

His lips thin more than she thought possible, eyes darting down to Harry. “I couldn’t let-” 

“My husband is _dead_ because of you.”

“You would have been too!”

“You knew he- you knew _Voldemort_ was after my son, and you deliberately kept me away.” 

“I won’t apologize for you being alive-” 

Lily hurls a cutting curse at him, slicing open his cheek. He doesn’t even have the decency to flinch as blood beads down. “Fuck you Snape.” 

“Lily please-” 

“It’s Potter to you,” she snaps, and his face tightens at that. 

“Fine.” 

Dumbledore, always a man of impeccable timing, arrives in that moment. Lily’s wand still leveled at Snape, Harry tugging on a loose curl, and Snape beginning to retreat. 

“Call the aurors,” Lily says. 

Snape draws his wand, but Dumbledore’s faster, summoning it to himself. “Very well.” 

A silvery phoenix erupts from his wand, and Snape turns to her. “Please, they’ll send me to Azkaban- I’m not- I’m not like the others.” 

“Azkaban,” Lily pronounces slowly, “is nicer than you deserve.” 

.

The first week, hell the first month, without James is positively easy compared to what follows. For in that first bit of time, it’s still hard to process that he’s really gone. Voldemort is declared vanquished, and James a war hero. Pettigrew turns out to be the worst sort of traitor- wasn’t even tortured, he gave up information willingly and is rotting in Azkaban for it. (She can’t help wish him dead.)

That first month is her and Sirius and Remus, all rebuilding the Potter cottage. Her and James spent too long perfecting it, made too many memories to let it stay in ruins. She can’t imagine raising Harry anywhere else, refuses to entertain the notion.

The world keeps turning, turns easier without a Dark Lord, and Lily can’t lay about grieving. She has a son to raise. She remembers when they joined the Order, her and James talking about possible careers after the war. Aurors, they decided- for surely if they lived, they’d have the experience. 

Lily could laugh, or cry, at their naive selves. As if she would ever pick a profession now that could endanger Harry’s last living parent. Besides, the Potter fortune can support generations of wizards before running dry. It’s inconsequential that she didn’t want to depend upon it before. Harry’s well-being matters so much more than her pride. 

A month later, and Sirius is drinking himself into a stupor regularly enough that he moves to Grimmauld. She feels for him, she does, but Sirius has always been a volatile drunk, and she doesn’t want him around Harry like that. 

Remus stays. 

He’s irritatingly perfect with Harry, has more patience than herself, can explain anything in a way that makes Harry smile, and is an endless font of bedtime stories.

Everything’s going well until a sunny afternoon where Remus is coaxing Harry to take a nap. Remus is finishing up a story about the unicorn foal that took the long way home, and Harry’s nodding off. 

“’anks Da,” Harry mumbles, out like a light. 

Remus leaves. 

(Lily could have been gentle about it, she reflects afterwards. But it _hurt_ and maybe she felt guilty about how easily Remus slipped into their family, as if all the past could be swept under the rug.)

.

It takes a year before Lily realizes Remus didn’t move in with Sirius. He never told Sirius he left the Potters’ and Lily saw him around Grimmauld the few times she visited. There’s very few people she’ll trust to watch her son while she makes such trips, but Augusta Longbottom is a sharp witch. And she can’t help but hope Harry and Neville will become friends, she does so miss Alice. (Once a year she goes to St. Mungo’s, feels worse each time, to see her former best friend reduced to a shell of a person.)

She corners Remus the next time she’s making her monthly Sirius visit. (She can’t blame Sirius for living like this, if it weren’t for Harry she’d be right beside him. Doing whatever it took to keep her mind at bay.)

“Where are you living?” 

There’s a touch of color in his cheeks, and Remus always has been the worst of lying between the four of them, gives it away before he even speaks. 

“I’m fine, I found a pack-” 

“Come home.” 

“I don’t need your charity,” Remus says softly, not meeting her eyes. 

“I do. Harry misses you dearly and I- I can’t raise him alone.” 

Remus swallows, “He has a godfather.” 

Lily raises an eyebrow, and he sighs. 

Remus returns. 

(For good this time.)

.

The world keeps turning. (She hasn’t found a way to fix that yet.) Lily doesn’t take walks alone anymore, and prefers to apparate. Sirius starts drinking less and makes up for it by fucking any attractive witch or wizard he can find. He even manages to seduce Rosmerta, something Lily verifies because she cannot believe it. 

The blonde winks lasciviously at her as she collects their butterbeers. “Aye, that Black is a determined one. Determined as a dog with that tongue. You should give him a go.” 

She brings the drinks back, and Sirius immediately licks the foam off of his. And Lily bursts out laughing, can’t stop until there are tears streaming down her face. 

Rosmerta isn’t the first person to suggest she go to Sirius. Though most mean more long term, he is after all, the most eligible bachelor in Great Britain. A title he’s happy to parade about and snicker over. Him and James used to be inseparable, two peas in a pod. Hell, _looking_ at Sirius still hurts. The way there’s a heavy empty space beside him, she can’t imagine touching him.

Remus starts dating someone new, spends less time at home. Well. That simply won’t do. 

She waits a few months. Harry isn’t old enough that the timing is critical, and she was friends with a Slytherin long enough to know how to be sneaky. (The gentlest of all lessons Snape ever taught her.)

A few months later, and Remus is still dating the same person. But he hasn’t introduced them to her or Sirius- she doesn’t think Sirius has even noticed yet- and the time has come. 

She lets him catch her drunk on the couch, Harry long tucked away, and a nearly full moon in the sky. 

“Oh Lils,” he murmurs, and she couldn’t ask for a better opening. 

“Only James ever called me that.” 

“Fu- I mean sorry I didn’t-” 

She waves an indulgent hand at him, “Whatever. Did he give you a special nickname too?” 

Remus goes absolutely still, and Lily has to keep a victorious grin off her face. “He told me about you two. Fifth and sixth year. So?”

Remus collapses onto the nearest armchair, rubbing his face. “Ree.” 

How… quaint. 

“Ree,” she echoes, and it sounds just as childish out of her mouth. “Ever think of how much better everything would have been if you’d been enough for him?” 

He chokes on nothing, and Lily lets out a bitter laugh. “And now all we have is each other. How fitting. James would have- y’know before, I was ready to die in the war. I had accepted the likelihood, but somehow I never imagined only one of us dying.” 

Remus is before her, quick or maybe she drank more than she realized while waiting. “Easy, let’s get you to bed.” 

He tucks her in, with soft words, hands hesitating over the blankets. 

Lily grabs one, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t- it isn’t your fault. Stay with me Ree?” 

Remus swallows, pulls off his sweater. “Yeah. Alright Lils.” 

And just like that, Remus has a new bedroom, the old one turning into a studio. (The best lesson Snape ever taught her, may his soul be devoured, was to be decisive.)

.

Remus is the gentlest man she’s ever been with, overcompensating for his werewolf nature and treating her as if she were a widow of glass. Funny, how easily he forgets she made the first move. 

Lily kisses him deeply, searching out any past echo of James. There’s something in the way he uses his lips, or maybe she’s been imagining it, willing to superimpose her dead husband any way that’s plausible enough. (Grief never tasted so good.)

She drops wet kisses over his neck, muggle purple lipstick smearing. He groans, and ah yes, she was right about the marking thing. 

“Let’s try something new tonight,” Lily murmurs, and Remus props himself up on an elbow. 

“Alright, what d’you have in mind?” 

She bites her lip delicately, watches his eyes flick down. “Rougher.” 

His eyes shoot back up, “Oh?” 

“Like- like how you fucked James.” 

His eyes flash gold, teasing manner sliding right off his face. His fingers pinch her side, too tight to be cute and she welcomes the pain. 

“You sure?” he asks gruffly, teeth sharper in this light. (She wants them everywhere, chomping hard for the wolf doesn’t know the lunar schedule, always bites to turn or kill.) 

“Yes.” 

He doesn’t hold back, scratching and biting, thrusting into her harshly without the usual degree of foreplay. There’s no more caution, and Lily revels in it. He doesn’t taunt her, is too good for that, but Lily can do it herself; James whispering in her head all of the things Remus used to do to him. 

Physically speaking, the sex is far closer to how James and her would fuck. It has the same impulsive drives, wild desires set loose. Where anything is fair game as long as the other is moaning, and Lily nearly forgot how fucking nice consecutive orgasms are. 

Mentally though, it feels less like James, uniquely Remus somehow, and Lily could scream out of frustration. It isn’t fair that Remus’ presence keeps growing, it was supposed to fade.

(She does scream, later in the morning, frustration and euphoria tangled together.) 

.

Lily loves Sirius, but really, he isn’t the most observant dog in the pound. It takes a year before he picks up on her and Remus, invites her over one day alone. 

He builds up to the topic slowly, the consummate pureblood. Lily idly wonders if it’s the house, but then Sirius is splashing firewhiskey in his tea, and oh, he’s just feeling awkward. She smirks to herself, didn’t know it was even possible to make Sirius feel that way, she should win an award of some kind.

“Aw hell,” he grumbles, chugging the entire teacup. “James and Remus used to fuck. If Remus is- look I know you two have something going on, and you should know. Back in school, before you ever looked Prongs’ way.” 

For a split-second, Lily imagines telling him everything. Sirius would understand, perhaps the only person in this entire world that would. But the moment passes, and instead she shrugs, a crooked smile on her lips. 

“I know. James is what brought us together.”

“Ah. Cheers then,” Sirius says, topping them both off, happy to pretend the conversation never happened.

Lily sips some, enjoys the fire dancing down her throat. “Harry’s birthday is coming up-”

Sirius snorts, “I know my godson’s birthday.” 

“And,” Lily continues, “we’re getting him his first broom.”

“Finally!” Sirius exclaims with a grin.

“I’ll remind you that he’s turning _six_. It’s going to be a toy broom.” 

His smile doesn’t lessen, which is admittedly a little worrying, “The Newborn Nimbus line just came out- it’ll be perfect!”

(To her genuine surprise, it _is_ perfect. Her and Remus lay on the grass, watching Sirius and Harry zoom around the yard. Harry’s a natural, will make a great Chaser one day.)


End file.
